Non-Formal Education and Learning in Europe: The Role of the Council of Europe

This chapter explores the contribution made by the Council of Europe to the Europeanization of learning through its commitment to promoting “non-formal education and learning”, within which “youth work” plays a pivotal role. Celebrating 50 years in 2022, the Council of Europe Youth Department has developed and diversified a range of projects and programs for its 46 member states, anchored within its distinctive participative and inclusive methodologies. The chapter draws on four illustrations of this practice: the international reviews of national youth policy 1997–2016; the Advanced Training the Trainers (ATTE) course that ran from 2001 to 2003; the “Madzinga” long-term training course (2002–2003) delivering experiential learning through outdoor education; and the pilot Master in European Youth Studies (2011). The increasing depth and diversity of the Youth Department’s activities have helped to produce a generation of young people with a European identity, an understanding of alternative ways of learning and teaching, and a belief in the transformative impact of transnational and intercultural learning.